Guided or Freehand sharpening...

joesrx said:
If I did dip in, I have an atoma 400 (used for flattening) and a spyderco fine stone. I also have a course/fine Arkansas stone.

What would be my next purchase? I was think a atoma 1200 to follow up from the 400 and finish on the spyderco.

Of course this would be to start the learning. Thoughts please.
Click to expand...

What kind of steel do you sharpen?

What do you mean with "coarse" Arkansas? A Soft Arkansas or a Washita? Fine is Hard Arkansas?

Diamonds leave deep scratches but work with every steel. So if you are going to sharpen softer steels / low alloy steels mainly, you would not need another diamond plate. You could also use a Japanese stone like Shapton Pro, Imanishi Arashiyama 1.000, a King 1.000 or similiar stones. Or a Fallkniven DC521. One side fine diamond, other side ceramic. Would give you two grits to close the gap between Atoma 400 and Spyderco Fine.
 
Most of my knives are harder steels hence the diamond plates. I did try the Arkansas stones and they were listed as fine and medium. I was able to sharpen a buck 110 pretty well. Not great, but it’s sharp. I think I’ll grab a fine diamond stone and I could polish with the spyderco or Arkansas stone.
 
I’ll look at the fallkniven stone, thanks
 
Last edited:
joesrx said:
Was supposed to be look. lol on the lol. Edited it.
Click to expand...
:) Thanks for editing that.

I have this stone and use it regularly. Gives a very nice edge. Works with harder steels, too. And is a nice step from coarse diamond to Spyderco Fine. Just my thoughts.
 
joesrx said:
What would be my next purchase? I was think a atoma 1200 to follow up from the 400 and finish on the spyderco.
Click to expand...
Depends on the steels you have. Diamond works on every steel, but isn't the best for every steel. If you don't have super steels 4% or more Vanadium, I'd personally get water stones.
 
what stones do you have then mate?
Old Biker said:
No they are not needed. I assume the bonded diamond or CBN stones will last longer. But I have been using my Diamond plates for somewhere between 5 and 10 years, I have yet to wear them out. My coarsest stone (140 grit) is starting to dull, so I bought another set, Then found I already had a spare 140 grit. It'll be a while before I need to buy any more stones.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks all.
So i ended up with both!
I managed to pickup a TSProf Kadet, spare clamps, full set of new Edge Pro Diamond Matrix stones with some SiC powders for later down the line, a strop loaded with Gunny 6um and a Kunwu Pulsar for £500.

I am going to order some Diamond bench stones from Knives and Tools tomorrow and have the best of both worlds., may change my mind and get some Sytools Diamond of Aliexpress ?
 
I would wait to see if anyone has used those particular stones to see what they thought. Cheap diamond stones are more trouble than they are worth. The diamonds come lose and wind up scratching the knife. They also don't last very long. DMT or Ultra Sharp are two known good makers of diamond plates. You will love 8x3 with a good clamping holder.
 
joesrx said:
If I did dip in, I have an atoma 400 (used for flattening) and a spyderco fine stone. I also have a course/fine Arkansas stone.

What would be my next purchase? I was think a atoma 1200 to follow up from the 400 and finish on the spyderco.

Of course this would be to start the learning. Thoughts please.
Click to expand...

I can't remember if I commented on this post yet.
I do all my grinding and sharpening freehand.

I'm quite sure my edges areen't even close to bieng perfect, but they are Sharp.

I have an atoma in its finest grit. I'm still not used to diamonds, still seems coarse to me?

Afterwards I clean up on an Artic Fox bench stone. https://byxco.com/products/byxco-arctic-fox-bench-stone?_pos=2&_psq=bench&_ss=e&_v=1.0

It's cheap, and I really like the feel of using it. It's kinda silky.

He's a member Here.

Then I finish off my blade on a Gossman's large steel.... He's also a member Here.
 
I dipped and dodged. I got the Shapton rockstars in 500, 1000, and 4000. I also have the atomas in 140, 400 and 1200. Now to practice and practice some more. Thanks all.
 
TheOne45 said:
What trouble for example? Did you tried them....are you talking from your experiences?
Well; my cheap diamond stones work just fine for more then 3 years now.
Click to expand...
Cheap diamond stones from Harbour Freight were more trouble than they were worth. They were very cheap. Folks need to look into how they are constructed, the materials and how they are bonded together.
 
TheOne45 said:
So you speculated all diamond stones with low price are bad quality.
Click to expand...
Please read what I said. And, yes you are correct, I should have specified cheap Harbor Freight diamond stones.

I would wait to see if anyone has used those particular stones to see what they thought. Cheap diamond stones are more trouble than they are worth. The diamonds come lose and wind up scratching the knife. They also don't last very long. DMT or Ultra Sharp are two known good makers of diamond plates. You will love 8x3 with a good clamping holder.

I suggested he wait to see what others thought about those stones. That implies that if they are cheap but work well, all is good. Simple. And yes, there are cheap diamond stones that are worthless. Make sure you have someone's recommendation. What's so wrong with that? If you know of great cheap diamond stones, that's wonderful. Share your experience.
 
Last edited:
I enjoy freehand. On most knives, I hold the stone in left hand and knife in right , and freestyle. On knives that need a lot of work or a heavy reprofile I will do that on a guided sharpener. My guided setup is set for just a slightly lower angle than my normal freehand angle.

I use a combination of cheap diamond plates. These are the thin plates from the big river. Once broken in, (I run and old plane iron on them for a bit with windex.) they perform fairly well and hold up ok. Use these for travel and coarse grits for damaged things.

Expensive diamond matrix stones, these things are amazing as I run a lot of hard high carbide steels.

A few Shapton HR Glasstones. These are amazing too and love to use them when I don't mind taking things a bit slower.

And I just picked up a fairly large natural in 10000 that is pretty cool. I just prepped an AEBL blade on that for today and........ WOW.
 
Grizzly3 said:
And, yes you are correct, I should have specified cheap Harbor Freight diamond stones.
Click to expand...
I think there is some sort of misconception floating aroun about 'cheap' or we should say 'low price' products in general. I don't know where it came from but the general belief is you need to buy expensive stuf if you want quality.
Sometimes that's not true. In some cases high price and reputable manufacturer or even 'made in usa' logo does not stand for top quality product. I can only talk about electro plated diamond stones because I have no experiences with other diamond stones.
For example, I have never used DMT diamond plates but I have seen high magnified photos from two different sources how those plates are contaminated with larger particles. The same goes for Spyderco diamond stone-there are diamond bildups on edges. Those stones from both of those 'thrusty manufacturers' are not cheap.

What can I say about cheap diamond plates I am using?
First set of diamond plates I bought from one big internet store and the second from other big internet store but all of them look and feel the same like comming from same manufacturer.
Yes, they are also contaminated with larger particles as DMT stones and some of them have some diamond bildups on edges as Spyderco plates.
So what I usually do?
All electro plated diamond stones (cheap plates, DMT, Spyderco, Ultrasharp....) should be first break-in. I use machined piece of HSS steel. Then I chamfer the edges if there are some diamond bildups.
I'm am just an average sharpener but after more then three years I can't detect any significant wear or drop of performance on the plates I have.
 
I went with Ultrasharp from Best Sharpening Stones for about $130 now. Not sure what I paid a few years ago. It included 300, 600, 1200 and a holder. Later, I bought their 3000 for use on my K390 Endela. I've been pretty happy with them. At the time some were saying that the quality was a bit better than DMT. Who knows? After the terrible Harbor Freight $10 experience, I was leery of "cheap" diamond stones. Their stones would come lose and leave terrible scratches. I think I finished them off sharpening an axe or machetes before pitching what was left of them. One other stone I like is the Spyderco medium ceramic. I have the fine and extra fine but I really can't recommend them and only use them occasionally.
 
This contribution has 2 intentions - to give my recent experience on guided systems, and with the diamond stones used by them
I have recently bought a TSprof Pioneer and couldn't be more satisfied. It replaced a KME which I soon realised had too many shortcomings on blades longer than 150mm which is pretty well all my kitchen knives. Here in Australia there is no such thing as a legal EDC unless it has less than a 100mm blade.
Those shortcomings include the tightening of clamps on both the blade holder and the stone holder, the large angle variation from tip to centre as a result of the geometry of the frame, the 4" stones and more.
The TSprof while 50% more expensive including stones solved all these issues. If you buy only the kit without stones it's cheaper than the KME with diamond stones.
As for stones, in Australia we have ready access to Chinese items including diamond stones via Temu. A Jende 6"x1" diamond stone from a local sharpening retailer costs me A$80 delivered, a 6"x0.75" stone from Lanboashi in China via Temu costs A$5 delivered. I doubt that the cheap ones will last as long as the Jende but my experience so far is that the Jende won't last 10 times as long, even allowing for the odd manufacturing shortcoming in the Chinese product (in the 12 stones I have bought to date had no issues). The saving in 4 stones enables me to buy a Miyabi gyuto.
Bottom line is that I have a TSprof with 6" Chinese diamond stones, for the same price as a KME kit with it's 4" diamond stones.
This is not a knocking of other's views, just my experience.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top